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To rethink curriculum we must be prepared to investigate those very apparatuses on which curriculum implicitly and explicitly rests, chief among whom is the epistemic stance we call "reason." For it is precisely in such investigations that the ontological character of knowledge is revealed, taking us closer to the structures that underwrite the modern curriculum. It is suggested that the deconstruction and resultant self-consciousness of reason can contribute meaningfully to the pedagogic situation. In other words, ratio is, or could be, more than a mode of conveyance, arrangement of thought, or logical apparatus; under sustained interrogation, it reveals the metaphysical "spin" and the consequent "gyroscopic" stability that underwrite its self-presence. To the extent that each subject of reason becomes cognizant of this ontological underpinning, reason becomes a living process and not something supplied from the outside as fixed epistemic procedure. The present chapter looks into the enigma of reason with reference to the works of Kant, Husserl, Freud, and others, coming upon interesting dissonances and aporias that are at odds with the public face of reason. This alerts us to the reconstructive possibilities of reason within the curriculum.

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-61106-8_2

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